more heat than light wrote:My cousin tried to kill me and my family by setting fire to our house. We don't really speak any more.

WTF why?

Long story, but we went to a gig and on the drive back he got aggressive with my brother who was driving and started punching him in the back of the head. My bro kicked him out of the car and made him walk home, but as he got out he said "you're going to die tonight". My bro obviously laughed it off, but then we woke up in the early hours of the morning with the house full of smoke. He's broken into our adjoining garage and set it on fire. We all escaped safely but it was pretty scary.

Police were involved but could find no evidence so no case was ever made. He's never admitted it so he's still accepted by our wider family but yeah we don't have anything to do with him. He does have some mental issues but that's hardly an excuse.

KingK wrote:I'm sorry but those of you who choose not to speak with members of your own family don't deserve happiness. Sort yourselves out. You don't know how lucky you are to have a family.

I grew up an only child due to my father dying from cancer a couple of months before, yes before, I was born. My mum has no siblings and my late father's brother lived in Australia. I grew up an only child in a single parent family through no fault of anyone. I yearned for a brother or sister for many years but my mum never met anyone else and it never happened.

I'm now married for over 10 yrs and a father of 2 Boys. My mum is still alive and I speak to her every day. Sure, she annoys me sometime but she's my mum and I'll love her and be there for her until her end. She's in her eighties now.

Embrace your family. No matter what.

I'm genuinely sorry about your dad - no child should have to grow up alone and God knows I'm lucky I had my brother as a kid. I'm glad you have a good relationship with your mum and your kids, and I agree family is an important thing. Contrary to what you seem to think it's not an easy decision to cut a parent out of your life.

I don't really like talking about personal gooseberry fool on here but I'll give you a sanitised run through of some greatest hits, to try and help you understand what kind of choice some of us have to make. Spoilered, so that no-one has to read it if they don't want.

My dad mentally abused my mum. He's lied to my face on several occasions, about a whole range of things from petty to extremely important. I asked him not to lie to me again, and asked him to get treatment for whatever problems he was going through - he told me he was going to see a psychiatrist, gave me weekly treatment reports etc. Turns out they never happened, he might not even have gone once. That was the last straw.

He had multiple affairs. On my brother's first day of high school, he was caught seeing another woman, the same woman he missed my sixteenth birthday to be with. On the day I received my MSc, he asked not to attend in order to see a different other woman(under the guise of a work event), and only did show up - late - when my mum essentially ordered him to be there. He was caught by that woman's husband on the morning of the graduation and nearly beaten up, as I recall we found out.

The poor guy came to my mum's house the next day to tell her what was happening pretty much in tears. I once watched one of the women he messed around turn up at a family dinner and punch him in the face because he'd lied to her as much as he did to us. There's a running joke between me and my brother that we'll probably get a knock on the door one day from a half sibling located anywhere between Glasgow and Blackburn.

He manipulated a lot of my mum's friends away from her, so me and my brother are really her only support network, and have been since I was 14 and he was 9. I've had to watch her depression eat her alive for 14 years - half of my life. My dad has offered no support, no encouragement. He has made little effort to contact me since I changed my name beyond a token text about Blackburn once or twice a year, and a Christmas card which he puts through my mum's door for no other reason than to remind her that he's still nearby, living in the house that she was brought up in, less than two miles away.

And do you know the worst part is that I would certainly have some form of relationship with him, if I ever received any kind of inkling that he cared about something besides himself for a second. But I never have.

I love my mum, and I love my brother. They're my family, and they're the two people I'm closest to in the world outside of my partner and Loki. That will never change. But I was absolutely right to cut my dad out of my life for my continuing mental health and it's not your right to tell me that I don't deserve happiness for prioritising my own health over somebody else's manipulations.

Yeah but DNA!1

Corazon de Leon wrote:A bloke in my team's brother got married to a Polish woman a few months back. He went over to her small village for the wedding and said everyone was amazing, but he came back absolutely ruined off the unbelievable amounts of free booze.

Corazon de Leon wrote:I love my mum, and I love my brother. They're my family, and they're the two people I'm closest to in the world outside of my partner and Loki. That will never change.

Well strawberry float you too.

...

I think I occupy a bit of a weird space with my family, and am probably an example of the kind of thing I'm sure KingK meant in his post. They're all pretty much fine people, caring and will generally be there to help each other out when needed. And I feel almost no connection or attachment to them. I can easily go weeks if not months without speaking to my parents, and have gone years without speaking to cousins I essentially grew up with. My parents separated when I was young and neither has been in a committed relationship since, and I have no siblings. I mostly spent my formative years feeling detached from other people and it's carried through to this day (most times when I contact my parents it's more because I feel I should than because of any innate desire to). I still get on with them, love them even, but they don't particularly factor into my life in any meaningful way. I am far closer to friends than I ever have been to family.

Anyone who's met my parents will likely find it strange to hear me talk about them that way, as when I'm with either my mum or my dad we get along fine. But now we only tend to see each other around twice a year, and I am absolutely fine with that.

KingK wrote:I'm sorry but those of you who choose not to speak with members of your own family don't deserve happiness. Sort yourselves out. You don't know how lucky you are to have a family.

I grew up an only child due to my father dying from cancer a couple of months before, yes before, I was born. My mum has no siblings and my late father's brother lived in Australia. I grew up an only child in a single parent family through no fault of anyone. I yearned for a brother or sister for many years but my mum never met anyone else and it never happened.

I'm now married for over 10 yrs and a father of 2 Boys. My mum is still alive and I speak to her every day. Sure, she annoys me sometime but she's my mum and I'll love her and be there for her until her end. She's in her eighties now.

Embrace your family. No matter what.

Can we have a new category in the End of Year awards? It's just this post. No context. Just "Best Insulting Post of the Generation" and this post.

more heat than light wrote:My cousin tried to kill me and my family by setting fire to our house. We don't really speak any more.

+1 for murderous cousins. Two of my second cousins tried to poison my great uncle to get his inheritance, he survived luckily.

+1 for murderous cousins except mine was successful. Incarcerated in 2003 when I was 12. I wrote to him for the first few years but dropped out of touch as I learned to be disgusted at what he'd done. Must be up for parole in the next few years.

For what it's worth KingK, if I "don't deserve happiness" as I choose not to speak to my father now for myriad reasons (including long-term issues after a death in the immediate family as you had - but a sister rather than a parent) - then so be it. Thank you for opening my eyes to this.

At least this talk of murdering cousins is taking some of heat from KingK's original post. What a happy few pages

I've chosen not to speak with my mother after I left home as she physically and emotionally abused me for 23 years, forcibly pulled me out of school because she thought I was too smart, and attempted to cover up times when I had been raped and beaten by a close friend of the family and my elder brother respectively. On the day I finally left home, she threatened to kill me with a knife and tried to bite my nose off.

Since I've moved out, I've been in a much better place, though. I have friends, a safe place to live, and for once, I'm feeling happy about myself.

I'm not planning on trading that in for another chat with mum any time soon.

Sorry, KingK, I'm sure you mean well, but on this occasion, family can go strawberry float themselves.

I've chosen not to speak with my mother after I left home as she physically and emotionally abused me for 23 years, forcibly pulled me out of school because she thought I was too smart, and attempted to cover up times when I had been raped and beaten by a close friend of the family and my elder brother respectively. On the day I finally left home, she threatened to kill me with a knife and tried to bite my nose off.

Since I've moved out, I've been in a much better place, though. I have friends, a safe place to live, and for once, I'm feeling happy about myself.

I'm not planning on trading that in for another chat with mum any time soon.

Sorry, KingK, I'm sure you mean well, but on this occasion, family can go strawberry float themselves.

Jesus Christ, that sounds awful. It’s good that you’re doing alright even after that experience, mate.

Just been doing a bit of casual browsing on POF and came across a profile that had this - If Edison had been afraid of the consequences, We’d still be sitting In the dark! So live more and take chances and one day it might pay off!